The Famous and the Dead ch-6

by T. Jefferson Parker

  “You mean get blamed?”

  He looked at her and nodded.

  “I read the headlines on the newsstand paper this morning and it said that ATF-see, I didn’t say FAT, now, did I? — had something to do with the gun that killed the congressman. They showed a picture of the gun. And of course the congressman. Agent Bly said some things. And then at the San Diego bus station there was one of those TV news loops on and they had a story about the assassination, too. They showed the same gun. And they showed just a second or two of you talking into a microphone in a big room full of important people. And later, Bly. But the sound was off so I couldn’t hear anything.”

  Hood felt his stomach tighten. He pictured Representative Grossly’s florid mask of outrage and heard his offended voice. “That gun got away from us during an undercover op four years ago.”

  “So you get blamed?”

  “I get to be the face of blame.”

  “Like put you all over TV and magazines?”

  “That’s possible.”

  “I’m trying to get on TV and magazines.”

  He smiled and for the first time today it seemed authentic. “I remember you saying that you wanted to be a model or star. Or a nurse.”

  “I read for a part in a play last week. And I got it, Charlie. I got it! I’m still pinching myself. The director’s a chick and she said she was going to work my black eye and the split lips into the character. ’Cause Curley’s wife is a sexualized object and is punished for it. And since my face’ll heal up before opening night, she’s going to have makeup do me up like it just happened. So I can thank Skull for getting me the part.”

  Hood managed his second authentic smile in a row. “I’m happy for you, Mary Kate.”

  “Maybe you’ll come see me.”

  “Maybe I will.”

  “I don’t make any money. It’s not an Equity play.”

  “Maybe it will lead to something better.”

  “Enough about me. How we gonna trap Clint?”

  Hood turned the monitor her way. “Here’s the Trailways schedule. We want him to pick you up in daylight hours so we can see what we’re doing. We’re in luck. There are arrivals through Las Vegas Monday through Saturday, ten thirty every morning.”

  “Maybe I could actually take a bus into San Diego. Make it more real and convincing?”

  “I don’t want you anywhere near the Greyhound station or Clint Wampler.”

  “You’re a good boss, Charlie.”

  “Tell him Saturday, ten thirty. Five days from today. Less people downtown.’’ Hood copied the Greyhound schedule on a noisy old printer and circled the Saturday ten thirty arriving from Las Vegas, like she was too dumb to remember it. He pulled a San Diego Thomas Guide from a desk drawer. “Let’s go to the conference room. I want to bring Dale and Janet and Robert in on this-we can get your lines right and figure how this should work.”

  “I don’t stay in any room with Dale. It’s him or me and you can choose.”

  “He’s not a bad guy. You embarrassed him.”

  “I embarrassed him? And he’s not a bad guy? Don’t you tell me how to interpret character, Charlie Hood.”

  “How about this? We’ll leave him out but he’s still not a bad guy.”

  “You just gotta win, don’t you? Even if it’s just a little something, you still have to win it. I understand that. I’m the same damned annoying way!”

  • • •

  It was dark by the time the meeting was over. Her shoes echoed faintly with Hood’s on the marble of the ATF hallway. On his way past the security station, Hood rapped his knuckles lightly on Oscar’s desk, so Mary Kate did, too. The big man offered her a withering look, then a smile. Under a deep purple sky they walked from the lobby to the intersection near the bus stop and she said good-bye and could tell by his expression that he felt bad leaving her there alone.

  She buttoned up her coat and headed toward the old part of Buenavista because she’d heard the Mexican food at Club Fandango was the best. Of course she’d invited Hood and the two agents to go with her and of course they’d turned her down. There was a line with these people, she had concluded: They could help you if you could help them but that didn’t establish anything at all personal. And Charlie Hood maybe didn’t have a woman in his life but that didn’t mean he had one flicker of interest in her. An SUV came up behind her going kind of fast and she moved over and turned her back to it and watched the thing whiz past, brand-new, beautiful blue paint job, looked like it was right off the showroom floor.

  She climbed a gradual rise and the streets turned from asphalt to cobblestone and became narrow. The buildings grew older and somehow more interesting, and although many were simple flat-roofed rectangles, many were built with ornate arched doorways and cool-looking mud-brick adobe walls. One building had a plaque outside about it being in the National Historic Register because a man born there had distinguished himself in the War of 1812 and later become the vice president of the United States. There were iron streetlamps on curved stanchions that looked a hundred years old but she was pretty sure there wasn’t electricity in Buenavista in 1913, so maybe these were added. Their light had a nice glow that showed off the crooked stone street. Above, the sky was the same dark desert blue as that swanko SUV, with small stars just peeking out then ducking back behind the darkness again like they were shy.

  She entered a wide, flat circle with a beautiful old church and big shade trees and people sitting and walking. She liked the way that many of the young men were dressed, not like in Russell County at all-all hoodies and jeans with their butt cracks showing-and she saw that many were Mexicans, which reminded her that Tony, her boss at work who had Mexican blood in him, was always groomed well and dressed nicely compared to most of his Anglo counterparts. She had read that Latino American men spent twice the money on personal grooming products as other American men, for whatever this was worth. She read another plaque, which identified the church and explained that this area, called a zocalo in Spanish, was the center of Buenavista social life until the city had been divided into two sides along the border in 1848. Since then the Mexican side of Buenavista had built its own zocalo while this place remained a part of California and the United States.

  She came to a marketplace where most of the merchants were packing up their wares for the day. She wondered why they moved so unhurriedly. Under the strands of tiny twinkling lights lay tables of big yellow grapefruit and tomatoes and oranges and lemons and avocados, flats of chilies, piles of onions and garlic. She was suddenly very hungry.

  Soon she came to the lighted plaza with its restaurants and clubs and shops and galleries. Behind the buildings the mountain rose and above the mountain the moon was buttoned, not quite half full now, but very clear and bright. She walked past a bunch of expensive cars and trucks and a large muscular doorman and into Club Fandango. It was dark and reminded her of a saloon in a Western movie. A pretty hostess greeted her and suggested she dine in the cantina if she was dining alone.

  The cantina was nearly empty this early and Mary Kate got her own booth. She ordered a margarita and the cocktail waitress asked for ID, so she presented the good fake that Skull had gotten for her so they could drink in public. Skull. Seems like a thousand years ago, she thought. What on earth did I see in you? Even with the straw, the salt on the margarita burned her lip cuts, but only slightly, so she lifted the glass and muttered a toast to herself and drank the whole thing down in two gulps. She caught a glimpse of herself in a mirror and thought she looked goofy sitting there alone with a beat-up face and an empty margarita glass. So she ordered another, then her arroz con camarones diablo arrived. Even though the dish was already “of the devil,” she had asked for extra spicy and indeed it was, an inferno of flavors and textures. It was hot enough to make her nose run and her whole lips burn, not just the cuts. She enjoyed it so much she ordered another. The waitress admitted it was her favorite dish also and brought her a complimentary margarita to help cool the f
ires.

  • • •

  Later back in San Diego she tiredly stepped off the bus and started the longish walk to her hotel. Her feet hurt. A light rain was falling and it was cold but nothing like Russell County cold. On Fourth, another blue SUV came sweeping past her, new and sparkling like the one in Buenavista. Even in the dark the cobalt blue was undershot with a wonderful metallic glow. Same truck twice in one night, seventy-five miles apart? Or two different vehicles, just a coincidence and nothing to worry about? Two different, she thought-get a grip, girl. She cut across the Gaslamp District and ducked into the Rack to find Tony and some of the other Kentucky Fried Chicken employees. They invited her for beers and no-slop eight-ball and she held her own against them, having spent some hours at this with Skull and Peltz and weird Wampler. All the while she kept her eye on the street outside, but the blue SUV never came by again and that was fine with her. Tony and Luis walked her to the Windsor Arms and when she got up to her room and looked out the window they were gone and a cobalt blue Explorer passed by, brand-new, no plates on yet, windows so dark she had no hope of seeing who was behind the wheel. Could be J-Lo or John Steinbeck or the man in the moon, she thought.

  She turned off her lights and sat back from the window in a comfortable old chair with the bedspread over her and called Hood. He wasn’t angry and didn’t sound sleepy even though it was after one in the morning, and he kept her on the line awhile, talking her down in his calm, one-thing-at-a-time voice. She said her first thought on seeing such a truck three times was Clint Wampler, but he’d just gotten the new Sebring, so that didn’t make sense. And she’d been fooling Clint real good over the phone. How could he know she was there? Hood was quiet for a moment, then he said she should file a police report in the morning-it was good to be on the record with things like this. He made her tell him several times exactly where she’d seen the vehicle. Then he asked who knew she was living in San Diego and she had to think about that one because really, she’d only told her mom and one brother back home, and of course Amy and Victor in L.A. knew because she’d stayed with them while she found a job. Hood wanted to know if any of them knew she was at the Windsor Arms or where she worked. Yes, she said, she’d given them all her new address, and told them about KFC, too. Not a single call or text back, however. Hood seemed very serious about every detail and very concerned that she’d told her family these things. He asked her to text him numbers for her mother and brother, and for Amy and Victor, just as soon as they were done talking.

  “Do not forget.”

  “I’m not an imbecile, Charlie.”

  “I know. But you’re tired and worried.”

  “What if it’s Clint and now he knows I’ve been here all along, leading him on? And what if he saw me going in and out of the ATF office, and he puts me together with you? You told me he was furious at you, for treating him like a moron and smashing his finger. He’ll be triple furious if he knows we’re a team.”

  “That’s what we’ll find out, Mary Kate.”

  “I like it when you say my name. Please talk to me now as an equal.” He asked about dinner and laughed when she said it was so good she’d eaten two. He asked about the play she was going to be in, and he said he’d always liked Of Mice and Men, and that he’d seen the countryside in California where the story was set. They talked about how her work at KFC was going, and after a while she felt like this was a conversation with a friend or relative. The SUV did not return. After she hung up, she got the numbers from her phone and her tattered address book, then settled back in the chair facing the window and texted them to Hood. She looked out at the street after every few entries. The rain looked like the tinsel you’d put on a Christmas tree. Two hours later she woke up with the bedspread pulled up tight and her phone on the floor.

  36

  The next morning Hood arrived early for work, parked in the semi-secure tenants’ lot, and pulled his war bag from the front seat of the Charger. He set it on the roof while he got his coat on and locked up, then used his reflection in the car window to adjust his felt fedora and snug his tie. He was wearing his best navy power suit and highly polished black Allen Edmonds cap-toes to ward off the sense of defeat that had hounded him since the death of his father and the OGR hearing. As he approached the stairs, a woman with a large microphone and a man with a video camera were waiting for him just outside the small lobby of the elevator bank. He recognized the reporter. The man was already shooting and the woman surged into Hood’s airspace with a flourish of hair and lipstick. “ATF Agent Charlie Hood, I’m Theresa Brewer with Fox News in L.A. How are you today?”

  “A little early to tell.”

  “What can you tell us about the gun allegedly used to kill Congressman Scott Freeman in San Diego last Saturday?”

  “That’s not our investigation.”

  “But you testified to Congress earlier this week about the gun.”

  “It’s an automatic machine pistol made by Pace Arms of Orange County.” Hood pulled the fedora brim low and stepped past them into the elevator lobby. But the woman followed him and the videographer was still shooting.

  “Is it true that you personally visited the accused assassin, Lonnie Rovanna, just five days before he murdered Congressman Freeman?”

  “I interviewed him as part of an ongoing investigation.”

  “What were you investigating?”

  “I can’t comment.”

  “Is it true that ATF lost track of one thousand such weapons in a botched investigation in two thousand ten?”

  “It wasn’t botched. We got outmaneuvered.”

  “But the guns went into Mexico, correct?”

  “We believe so.”

  “And now, apparently, at least one has come back to kill a United States congressman.”

  Hood hustled up the stairs to the second-story ATF offices. The steel steps made a ringing sound that echoed in the concrete stairwell. He heard Theresa Brewer’s footsteps behind him. “Representative Darren Grossly accused ATF of ‘irresponsible actions’ regarding these automatic weapons. He said the Department of Justice is, at the highest levels, quote, ‘trying to cover up these actions by stonewalling’ his investigation. Is this true?”

  Hood stepped onto the first floor landing and turned to face the journalist. “I testified. I didn’t stonewall. Have a nice day.”

  “Did you act alone?”

  “We always work in teams. Good-bye. I’m going to go to work now.”

  “Before you testified, did your superiors at ATF ask you to protect their superiors? Maybe even the attorney general himself?”

  “Don’t be silly.” Hood tipped his hat and unlocked the ATF suite with his name tag chip. Dale Yorth glanced at him from the water-cooler in the hallway. Theresa Brewer was asking another question as the heavy door locked behind Hood. He made it to his cubicle, aimlessly enraged, his heart beating hard.

  Yorth soon stood looking down at Hood over the low fabric partitions of the workspace. “Fox News?”

  “They must have seen me on C-Span.”

  “So did everybody else. I’m so sorry about this, Charlie. Can I come in?”

  Yorth sat next to Hood’s desk in the crowded cubicle. He had a slip of paper in his hand. “I just got off the phone with San Diego. Frank’s gotten interview requests from The New York and Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, Time. .” He looked down at the paper. “Well. . I couldn’t write fast enough. They all want to know about the Love Thirty-twos and they all want interviews with you. Soriana referred them to Washington but you know damned well they’ll be back. That Union-Tribune story yesterday really caught fire. Shit. Hold on.” Yorth pulled his cell, checked the number and answered, then was quiet for a long while. “Yes, sir. Okay. Now that’s a damned shame. He’s here now. Yes, sir, I will. No, sir, he won’t.”

  He hung up and shook his head. “Lansing just let IA loose on you, Charlie. You’re officially jammed as of right now. ATF has to show that something is being done. So
I’m to put you on administrative leave. The leave is paid-you just have to stay home and be accounted for. In a way it’s good. It will let you dodge these reporters. You know how it is-they’ll lose interest in a few days. Sorry, but this is direct from Lansing.”

  “Can I keep working?”

  “AL is fully paid.”

  “It’s not about the pay. It’s about Wampler. For all we know he’s still got that Stinger and he intends to use it.”

  “Do what you need to do, Charlie. Bust Wampler’s ass. But I don’t want to know about it. Just pick up the phone when IA calls. Be there. Act good. I’m on your side.”

  “I’m taking the laptop.”

  “I don’t hear you.”

  • • •

  Hood went to his office and called Mary Kate’s parents and siblings. Only her brother knew of Clint Wampler at all, and he knew very little-just some badass punk from a few towns over. But they all admitted to having told friends and neighbors about Mary Kate’s move to California. Her mother had to inform the school district, that was the law. Hood realized that scores of people in Russell County could know she’d gone to L.A. and the ones who knew her might assume she’d gone to stay with her old friend, Amy. All it took was one of them to be an acquaintance of Wampler and the circuit was complete.

  When Hood reached Amy by phone in L.A. she sounded vague and dismissive. Hood smelled fear. It took a few minutes of earnest cajoling but she finally admitted that Clint Wampler had showed up at her apartment when Victor was working. He’d put his hand on her throat and demanded to know where Mary Kate Boyle had got to and said if she went to the cops he’d come back and strangle her and leave her for Victor to explain. I’m real afraid, she said. Is Mary Kate okay? I shoulda called the cops. I shoulda, I shoulda.

  Hood told Mary Kate by phone, and for the first time in the several hours he’d spent with her, she was temporarily speechless.

  “Where are you now?”

  “Walking to work.”

  “Are you close?”